We weren’t kidding when we said things were picking up in the high-end sector of the housing market in my last post. Take a look at these sales!
In Larchmont, a 14-room, three-story brick and clapboard Colonial on a full acre in the coveted Manor section closed early this month after 305 days on the market for $4,750,000, down from its original listing price of $4,940,000. The completely renovated, 93-year-old home has four bedrooms, six full baths and a powder room, along with a heated in-ground pool and patio. If that’s not enough, it also has access to the Mill Pond, a fave spot for fishermen. Julia B. Fee Sotheby’s International Realty co-brokered the deal with Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage.
In North Salem, that dynamo Muffin Dowdle of Ginnel Real Estate has been working her magic again. She and Beth Golde of the same agency co-brokered the sale this month of a $3.4 million farmhouse (pictured above) built in 1925 that had been on the market for almost two years, listed at $4.45 million. It has four bedrooms, three full baths, and two powder rooms and sits on a generous 86 acres! A long, gated drive is lined by an allée of ancient sugar maples that winds past a scenic pond. The inside boasts hardwood floors and a stone fireplace. Outside, there’s a six-stall barn and paddocks.
No More Teeing Off at Ridgeway
The financially troubled, 100-member Ridgeway Country Club has finally found a buyer: the French-American School of New York. The school reportedly acquired the 128.6-acre site for $11 million, according to Geoff Thompson, a spokesman. The clubhouse and 18-hole golf course had been listed for some four months at $13.5 million.
The 825-student school has a preschool in Scarsdale, a lower school in Larchmont, and an upper school in Mamaroneck. It plans to create its main campus on the 128.6-acre site—retrofitting the existing club buildings and adding new facilities. A sizeable amount of the property is to be preserved as permanent open space.
White Plains had considered spending $15 million to create a semi-private recreational facility, but tabled those plans when the agreement was struck with the school, which was created in 1980 to provide a bilingual and bicultural curriculum to 
American, French, and international students. After failing to find a buyer with a previous broker last year, Ridgeway hired the brokerage CB Richard Ellis in September.
Good News for Yacht Club
Village officials in Mamaroneck have okayed a proposal by the Mamaroneck Beach and Yacht Club to build 23 new units of seasonal housing on its property. The club received unanimous approval from the village planning board for wetland permits and a site-plan okay. Now it can move ahead to the next step, which is to obtain building department permits, according to newspaper reports.
The latest move effectively ends the club’s six-year-old suit against the village to build the housing. Under the agreement with the village, the club must begin work within the next 18 months and construction within six years. Pleased a settlement was finally reached, Norm Rosenblum, the village’s mayor, called it a “present for the village of Mamaroneck in this holiday season.”
